The Le Palais, Belle Ille Disaster .......well almost.

I wanted a short sail today just 25 miles I wanted to get ashore have a good meal, have a walk and have a shower to feel normal again. I set off had a beautiful wind which died about 2 miles out from Le Palais, the main port, so on with the engine and on we go. Now just to paint the picture, Le Palais is an incredibly popular town with small fast ferries arriving every 15 minutes, the port is beautiful but very tight for space so manoeuvring is very important (remember that). So we get closer, I take a nice photo of the Citadel, the fort on the hill) then suddenly as I’m about 100 m from the breakwater the engine note changes, I loose power and I start sweating. My first thought the oil leak has got worse and the cylinder head gasket has blown, but no black smoke so not that. Has my prop fallen off, no, have a got a rope wrapped around my prop, as happened to our unfortunate friends Pete & Lou, YES and I thought oh no not now. I put the engine in neutral and decided as there was no wind to sail away from the breakwater that the only thing to do was to slip into my Tarzan outfit put a knife between my teeth, ignore the jellyfish who were obviously homing in on the smell of fear emanating from me, put on my goggles, tie a rope around me and jump in. This I did and found a huge mass of seaweed completely encasing the prop, I ripped this off and clambered back on board as the boat drifted towards the breakwater I bowed to the watching crowd slipped the engine into gear, the boat moved & I said a little prayer.. I moored against the breakwater and slumped in a sweaty pile and said another slightly larger prayer.Whilst waiting for my blood pressure to subside I was watching a couple of old boys fishing from the breakwater directly behind my boat, one hooked into a 3ft eel, a beautiful creature which must of weighed 4kgs, there was no way he was going to haul that up 25ft of breakwater wall without losing it so I volunteered to help. I blew up my dinghy, dug out my landing net, which looks brand new since I never catch anything apart from suicidal mackerel which jump into the boat themselves, and rowed over to the wall to help him land it. This done there was a lot of hand shaking and back slapping, he went off then 10 minutes later came back with a bottle of beer for me….Entente Cordialle!!!!
Le Palais is the very beautiful capital of Belle-Ile and is dominated by a huge star shaped fortress, the Citadel, it was thought to be impregnable but was taken by the British in 1761. I walked up the hill to take these shots, it was further than I thought so appreciate them please!
I went ashore had a beautiful bowl of mussels and a large white wine or three for lunch then popped into the church to say thank you!